Third Shift, Volume II

The Shieldmaiden has made the call that she could not possibly care appropriately for the Dot and the Squirt, and since I lack certain hardware to provide care for the Squirt at this time,* I am once again the Dot's company for the night.

Currently, she is sleeping.  Do what you will to a human brain, certain rhythms do not go away.








By that, of course, I mean at this time of need, not that I expect to gain the equipment necessary at a later time.

Third Shift

Daddy's punching in for the night watch.  It's something of an unofficial tradition that Pedde fathers take first watch for a child coming out of surgery.  The Builder was the first person I saw when coming to after my facial reconstruction surgery fifteen years ago.  I will always remember his first words to me:  "Puke, you'll feel better."  This sage (and very effective) advice was followed by, "Now go pee before they stick a tube up your penis."

I shall be refraining from both of those pieces of advice.  For one, she doesn't seem to react to anesthesia with nausea.  And unlike her father, her surgery did not result in a liter of blood landing in her stomach.  The pee or get catheterized ultimatum also doesn't apply because she already is.

This morning started with a coffee and a half Klonopin.  After hiking over and starting the registration, we realized that Daddy had forgotten to bring the souped up Wubbanub.  A quick check of Daddy's vitals also showed half a Klonopin wasn't cutting it.  So, I ran back to the extended stay to wash down the second half and pick up the reinforced Wubbanub.  Upon entering, I received a text from the Shieldmaiden saying she was heading back to pre-op.  When we arrived, the Dot was given her own happy medicine while Mommy and Daddy talked to the doctors and nurses.  Unfortunately, at this time, Baby Einstein ran out, and the loopy Dot decided that the interruption was unforgivable.  So, the doctor picked her up and whisked her away to the OR.

Rather than wait for four to five hours, the Shieldmaiden and I decided to hop on the DART bus and head to the nearby WaHo for our usual order.  We hit the hotel to rearrange things, then embarked on our first MTA ride together.  Fortunately, it went much better than my first solo attempt last night, in which I spent half an hour in beautiful Garland after hopping the wrong bus, only to end up being picked up by the same bus that dropped me off.

We arrived at the hospital shortly before they started closing.

Dr. Fearon gave us the report on the surgery, the gist of it being that we had definitely made the right decision.  After rearranging her skull to provide adequate space for her poor brain, he apparently struggled to stretch the skin over it.  For my less medically inclined readers, that means her brain was considerably squished.  The neurosurgeon also decided to do the suboccipital decompression for the Chiari.  As far as she was concerned, the radiology was not conclusive enough, and she would make the call upon actually seeing the bone structure.  Apparently, the bone structure said, "Cut me!  Cut me!"

Nice to know there was, in fact, no other option.

By that time, the Dot was in PICU, so to save the Shieldmaiden the lovely images of a toddler returning from general anesthesia, I volunteered to go in first.

I'm glad I had taken another Klonopin.  It's one thing to have a sobbing, disoriented, combative toddler in pain.  It's quite another to not be able to do anything about it.  After making sure the worst was past, I tapped the Shieldmaiden for her turn.

Afterwards, we had yet another meal at the hospital's tasty and reasonably priced cafeteria.  Then, we split up with the Shieldmaiden taking the Squirt to our home away from home and me taking the night watch by the Dot's bedside.

Now, nothing to do but wait for her Ativan to wear off and welcome her back to the land of the living.

Joys of homeownership

As a wee little Medical Technology student at Austin Peay State University (Let’s go Peay!), one of the ways we learned intestinal bugs was by source.

Mayonnaise = Staph

Chicken = Salmonella

“Fresh mountain streams” = Giardia

Salad bars or dubious sanitization = Hepatitis C

Fried rice = C. dif

Hamburger = E. coli

That last couple are the ones of interest to this story.  It explains how a small amount of C. dif can get into your gut.  Usually, it’s crowded out by the normal flora of the intestines, but what happens when you eat at that Chinese restaurant that got a “B” on its last health inspection then at the burger joint that got a “C”?

Well, that nice little E. coli gives you a nice case of the poops.  The next day, you drop by the doctor, who gives you a scrip for some antibiotics.  Those wipe out the E. coli, but also all of your other Gram-negative normal intestinal flora.  As a result, there is nothing to displace the C. dif, and you end up in the hospital with an even worse and harder to treat case of the poops.

What does this have to do with plumbing?  Well, besides plumbing being where the infected poop goes, it is a perfect example of a treatment that causes unforeseen problems that are even worse than the original complaint.

When we entered our new home a few weeks ago, we were thrilled to finally be a place where the water went down the drains in a timely fashion.  Unfortunately, the Shieldmaiden voiced her contentment, at which point the Plumbing Gods perked up their ears and said, “Hey!  How did you get away from us?  We’re not done with you yet!”

It turns out that when a house sits for a few months, the pipes sometimes clog.  Not unheard of, so I borrow a Milwaukee powered snake.

This is where things got interesting.

Whoever thought using ferrous metal to carry water through damp ground was a good long-term solution to waste disposal is probably spending eternity unplugging Satan’s toilets.  I mean, really, I’m pretty sure that the phenomenon of “iron + water + time = rust” has been observed for a few millennia.

I unscrewed the cleanout and inserted the snake.  I ran into obstruction almost immediately and, after attempting to work the snake through it, withdrew the snake.  On the tip was gray clay.  This was my first hint that something was wrong.

After several attempts of alternating snake and Drain King, I ordered a USB sewer camera from Amazon.  While waiting for it to arrive, I rented a larger sewer auger from the local Ace Hardware.  Yes, Ace still exists.  I attempted to use it and simply got more clay.

My sewer camera arrived and I fed it down the cleanout.  My operating assumption was that it was still a clog, and I hoped that by examining it with the camera I could determine its composition and select a specific drain cleaner for it.  The plan was to then inject the drain cleaner directly into the clog using the camera to ensure placement of a vinyl tube.  Alternatively, I would use the camera to ensure placement of a snake head in the clog before turning it on.

Unfortunately, there was water obscuring the view.  Another quick trip to Ace and I returned with a long piece of vinyl tubing (that I figured I’d need anyway) and a drill powered pump.  I taped the tube to the camera and fed them both down.  After suctioning, I found I still lost view at roughly the same point.  When I pulled it back out…clay.

This left me with but one possible cause:  a broken pipe.  Which has but one recourse:  dig it up and replace it.

I had been in touch with our real estate agent off and on over the week, and she contacted the seller (another agent there) who dropped off a circular saw and brand-new DeWalt diamond blade.  I had also purchased a diamond blade.

By the end of it, the Shieldmaiden had also bought a diamond blade.

The first night, I cut a square-foot-and-a-half-ish hole.  Most people might have bought a dust mask and goggles, but I had one better.  After a tragic incident down South, I invested in the biggest fire extinguisher Lowe’s had and a Czech gas mask.  I’d have rather gotten a fire escape respirator, but those are about $300, and I figured that I didn't need to escape down a 500-yard hallway in an industrial plant full of toxic chemicals, so the $30 piece of military surplus gear would probably suffice to get my girls out of a tiny starter house before they end up buried next to me*.

So, I draped the area I would be working in, strapped on the mask, and went to work.  I scored the concrete with the saw, then busted it out with a sledgehammer.   On my first set of swings, I found that the copper water line above my head was not high enough to clear a full swing.  Fortunately, I discovered this with only bending the line, not breaking it.  The rest of my swings were taken on my knees, which considerably reduced the amount of weight I could throw into them.

I had the next day off due to the aborted deposition appointment from The Wreck, so I didn’t even bother digging up much the first night.  I cleaned off (quickly since showers over 90 seconds cause overflow of the washing machine’s output), had some painkillers, and went to bed.  The next morning, I awoke stiffer than I’ve been in a while.  I had my coffee, hobbled downstairs, pulled on the muddy, cold, and thoroughly disgusting jeans from the previous night, and went to work.

Ten hours and six Ace trips later, I emerged semi-victorious.  The hole was now about eight square feet, and the pile of busted concrete, dirt, and poop (all of which is generously soaked in bath water, pee, and dirty dish water) was about two-and-a-half feet deep.  In the course of the day, I was lacerated, abraded, infected, shocked, strained, cramped, and sprayed.   About four feet of new pipe has been laid including a double-clean-out trap.

In the process, I learned that black iron pipe is fragile and will break right off at the edge of your hole, requiring further sawing/hammering/shoveling to remove it and more trips to Ace to buy more pipe to replace it.  I also found out that while a cutoff wheel on an angle grinder is the gentlest was to cut through brittle pipe, one must take care how much water one exposes it to.

Some would have set the grinder aside...I just didn't choke up as far and dealt with the tingle.

This is what $150 in plumbing looks like.

And this is where it went.

Finally, exhausted and ready to quit, I yell up to the Shieldmaiden to turn the water on...and the washer’s outlet promptly overflows.  But slightly slower than before, so there was progress, at least.  At any rate, I throw in the towel and resign myself to another day of no dishes or laundry being done.

At work the following day, I called down to Ace on break to reserve the 50-foot auger again.  When I arrived that afternoon, they informed me that one of them had checked it out to someone and all that was available was the 100-footer.  They were good enough to just rent me the 100 at the rate for the 50.  Once home, it became apparent that I had probably lucked out, because while the nice cool cutting and auger heads didn't fit down my 3" pipes, when I sent the plain arrow tip in, I unspooled over half the drum getting to the obstruction.  Upon retrieval, I found nothing on the tip.  It was coming up on an hour since I had checked out the auger, and I was out of ideas, so despite lacking any real confirmation that I had cleared it, I said a quick prayer and fed the Drain King in anyway.  

I truned it on for about a minute, then turned it off.  Instead of backflowing as it previously had, there was a remarkable lack of disaster.  After calling for the Shieldmaiden to turn everything on upstairs and letting it run a few minutes with no complications, I tentatively declared victory and packed it in.

I refuse to formally declare victory for at least two weeks of uninterrupted success.  That said, I feel pretty sure that given the massive backlog of dishes and laundry, if it survives the weekend, we're all good.

A friend of the Shieldmaiden's remarked at the beginning of the troubles that you buy a home thinking you are buying a place to live, but in reality, you are just buying into an expensive hobby, which is a good summation.  However, in this particular case, I believe a better summation is my remark to a coworker today:

"We quit renting and bought a house because we were tired of figuratively pouring money down a hole, and now we are literally pouring money down a hole."

A deep and disgusting hone.

*Mad props to the US Army for letting them do that.

Addiction

Hi, my name’s Ethan, and I’m a B-movie-holic.

I’ve been clean for a month.  I last watched a Michael Madsen action flick one Sunday afternoon.

It’s been a struggle, but I simply decided I had better things to do with my time.  Some days my girls wear me out, and all I want to do is retreat to the bedroom with my Kindle.

I watch a couple episodes of Grimm every couple weeks, though.  It’s kind of a methadone for B horror.

All this to say I cannot believe the stupidity of a person who managed to accidentally off himself trying to get into rehab.

According to NPR (I really need to stop listening to that), a 31-year-old man got addicted to his prescription anxiety meds.  After a couple years, he decided he needed to clean up.  Unfortunately, he didn’t have insurance and couldn’t afford a thousand-dollar-a-day private clinic.

So, he applied for insurance, got it, and tried to check in to a public clinic.  Unfortunately, they had a one month waiting list.  At the end of the month, he was told he actually had to fail a pee test to get in.  So he told his mother he had to take some of his drugs, went to sleep on a couch, and never woke up.

That sucks.

First off, how much did you take?!?!  I mean, for the love of all things holy, all it would have taken is a single Xanax to make you test positive.  I understand overkill (you should see me build bookshelves), and you could have taken two to make sure you lit it up.  But to kill yourself, you had to have had half a dozen or more.

My big question is, though, if you were clean on your own for a month, why did you feel the need for rehab?  According to a government study, 86% of cocaine users kick it without any clinical or legal intervention.  How does the .gov define not being addicted?  Not having used it in a month.  Your own government calls you clean, dude!  You don’t need to apply to a rehab program as a patient…you need to apply to it as a counselor.

After my abysmal performance during the Dot’s sedated MRI, the Shieldmaiden insisted I go get some pharmaceutical intervention for the Dot’s surgery.  I got clonazepam.  Given that I cannot refrain from eating an entire Pringles can in two servings, I decided to ask for the smallest number of pills I could.  I got six to take half a pill up to three times a day for four days, which I suspect is the record smallest benzodiazepine prescription that pharmacy has ever filled.  I figure if I watched three episodes of Heroes a day on Netflix until I finished the series (which totally jumped the shark at season two, and I very much regret watching any further), then God only knows what I would do with a thirty-day prescription of Diet Valium.

If you got clean on your own for a month, you do not need to slink into a clinic convinced of your own helplessness.  You need to [redacted] walk tall.  Be proud, my friend.  You have more willpower than I, that’s for sure.

What killed this man is the conviction throughout this country that no one can do anything for themselves.  Everyone needs professional help.  From roto-rootering your drains to teaching your own [redacted] kid to ride a bike, you can hire anything out.

At the very least, use an escalation of force.  If you go a week clean on your own, try making it two.  Make it a month, and you’re probably free (right there with the 86% of the population that can kick crack on their own).

If you can’t do it on your own, try amateur help.  For one thing, it’s free and for another, there’s no waiting list.  Need to kick a chemical dependence?  Go join [Insert Your Addiction Here] Anonymous.  Plus, even if you can make a month without [IYAH]A, you should probably be there, anyway, to lend your wisdom to others.

Make professional help your last option.  The old saying is, “When seconds count, cops are only minutes away.”  In this case, if you’re in crisis, professional help is a month away.  You might as well be waiting for a knee replacement in Canada.  Why not try something in the meantime?  If nothing else, if it turns out you can succeed on your own or with [IYAH]A, then you’ll at least save a copay.

Stats

I just discovered audience stats for my blog.  Not surprisingly, most of my page views have been inside the US.  What is surprising is that that's only 60%.  So, since I am apparently international, an open letter to my audience:




Dear Russians,

Did I offend you?  You're number 2 with 295 views, but none in the last month.  What did I say?


Dear Germans,

I can only assume most of you are extended family members who went Googling our last name.  Hi, family members!  Come visit some time!


Dear Chinese,

I know it's probably just some automatic search algorithm that turned up this blog after my Tienanmen Square post, but please don't hack me.  I have no trade secrets.


Dear Ukrainians,

Give the godless communist bastards hell!*


Dear UK,

Here's to Scottish independence!  May it be considerably less bloody than Ireland's history.


Dear South Korean,

Sorry I haven't visited your blog recently, but to be fair neither have you.


Dear Israelis,

Lake?  Is that you?


Dear Sweden,

Love your Viking Metal.


And to all of my readers,

88,

KG7GPB


*There went any chance of my Russians coming back.

Life Coaching, Montana-style

So a wholebutt-load of fast food employees went on strike.

Their beef (sorry, couldn’t resist that one)?  They want $15 an hour.

Well, good luck with that.

They interviewed a KFC worker from Brooklyn, one Naquasia LeGrand.

She has worked as a cashier at Kentucky Fried Chicken for three years in Park Slope, an affluent neighborhood in Brooklyn. She makes $8 an hour and pays $1,300 a month for her apartment. She says fast food workers all over are struggling to survive. "We live in New York City--a multi-billion dollar city," she said. "These corporations are taking everything from us."

Really?  They’re taking everything from you?  Those bastards!  How are they doing it?  Do they have a gunman outside who demands your check from you on your way out each payday?  Has KFC hired hackers to strip the funds from your bank account? 

Oh, wait…they’re giving you a check?  They are paying you for your labor?  I’m pretty sure that’s not the definition of “taking.”

Really, if you want to look at who is “taking everything” from you, look at the state you’re living in.  You have the highest taxburden of any state.  You have rent controls, which are supposed to keep rent affordable but have actually decreased availability and affordability of housing.  $1300 a month for an apartment?  I’m going to be paying less than $900 a month for a house I’m buying.

It’s not a heck of a lot better on the West Coast.  The Shieldmaiden (who, by the way, has experience on the bad side of the register) has a former fellow student from her first college complaining about the cost of living versus his income.  Well, Cali is #45 for tax burden, and it, too has rent control, plus the further complication of free space laws.

Which brings us to my patented Improve Your Life Plan:

Stop whining and change.

Phase 1:  move.

“Go West, young man,” is still good advice.

In Bozeman, MT, McDonalds pays $12-14 an hour.  That’s almost what I made with a frikkin’ 4-year degree.  Montana has the #6^th lowest tax burden.  

According to city-data.com, Bozeman has a cost of living index of 94.3% of the US average.  Brooklyn has a 619.8%.  You can snag an apartment in Bozeman for over a grand less than that Brooklyn apartment.  LA is 135.3%, by the way.

If you go to the Bakken, you’d probably make $18.  Granted, housing’s almost as hard to find in the oil fields as in Brooklyn, but hey, it ain’t no $1300 a month.  In Williston, the cost of living index is 79.9%.

And before anybody says the Bakken is going to bust, it looks like it should be good for the next three decades.  Given that people with a GED are making over $100,000 a year (some prefer making $70,000 in nine months and going south for the winter, which after my first winter here, I thoroughly understand), that’s plenty of time to bank a poop-ton of money for when it does stop.

Which brings me to Phase 2 of the Improve Your Life Plan:

Change jobs.

Mike Rowe has been a huge boon for manual jobs.  I love his show and his work philosophy.  The only thing I wish he would mention on his show is how much money you can make if you’re willing to put up with jobs no one else wants to do.  Though, he does mention it here.

A coworker of mine's father recently sold his ranch.  Before he quit, he had a husband and wife team of farmhands.  He paid them half again as much as Ms. LeGrand is making…each.  Then he tacked on no-rent housing in an actual house on the farm.  Which, incidentally, also removed commuting costs.  Then, he sprung for their groceries.  Then, he sprung for their medical bills, including braces for their daughter.  For Pete’s sake, I had to pay for The Shieldmaiden’s braces, and we had a dental plan!

They were awfully cute, though.

Or if you want more, you can take that job in Bozeman and hit the local community college for your CNA.  Move up here and work at Valley View.  Within a year, you’ll be making $15 an hour, and you won’t even have to threaten to walk off to get it.

So, maybe you have to slave over a pile of poop, instead of a deep-fryer.  But I have it on good authority that the smell of bodily fluids airs out of clothes much faster than fast food deep-fry grease.

Let’s make it personal.  A little over a year ago, my family was in sad shape.  We had mounting debt.  My employer, Mountain State Health Alliance was broke and getting broker so pay raises weren’t exactly a big priority.  We had a nice house, but it was costing more than we could afford.

Worst of all, my job was second and then third shift.  I didn’t see the Dot and Lump for days at a time.  There may have been a day shift opening in the works, but that would have lost me my shift differential, which was 12% of my pay.

It was so bad, that for once, I didn’t delete the travel employment agency email in my box.  It advertised a job in Atlanta making a lot of money.  I short-noticed my boss (I really am sorry, Mary Ruth), and I went for it.

It didn’t work out that well.

As the end of the contract neared, I needed another job.  There were two jobs in Ohio paying a couple bucks more an hour than I had been making.  There was another position in Montana making quite a bit more.  Doubtful the Shieldmaiden would ever go for it, I still applied on a lark.  More of as a joke, really.

I told her and she rolled her eyes and said no way we were moving to the middle of nowhere.  She may have…ah…”emphasized” that statement.

The Ohio jobs were dragging their feet, and the place here had already given me a firm offer.  But given the distance from family, we were running numbers to see if we could survive two weeks without a paycheck.  We could have if I hadn’t buried two cars in 6 weeks thanks to crappy Georgia drivers, but I’m not bitter or anything…

Then I mentioned that the bright side of the Montana job was that it was day shift.  Somehow, I had failed to mention both Ohio jobs were seconds.  The Shieldmaiden’s reply?  “Oh, no.  We are not doing that again.”  Again, she may have emphasized that a bit more.

Now, I see my kids every day.  I net more than I grossed in TN.  We’re buying a house.  I have insurance that will make getting the Dot’s head surgery half-way affordable.  All it took was the courage to move.  Not on my part, because I was just operating on logic, but the Shieldmaiden officially has a pair of brass ovaries that drags the ground.

Or maybe it was just love for our growing family.  I was the sole breadwinner in TN (still am), but I was not providing much emotional support (and honestly wasn’t adequately supplying the bread, either).  We did what we had to do for the good of our children.  Sure, it took a little sacrifice—I don’t get to watch nearly as many B movies anymore—but it was worth it.

While the unnamed Californian in question probably just didn’t read the right books, perhaps he was a Breaking Bad fan and remembers this line:

What does a man do, Walter?  A man provides for his family…When you have children, you always have family.  They will always be your priority, your responsibility.  And a man?  A man provides.  And he does it even when he’s not appreciated, respected, or even loved.  He simply bears up and he does it.  Because he’s a man. - Gus

Or if you prefer a true story from someone who isn’t an amoral, ruthless drug kingpin:

My dad grew up back and forth between Kentucky and Virginia because his father was a coal miner. And when my dad was fourteen my grandpa came home and told my grandma to load up the truck 'cause they were gonna move. And when they took off they were going the wrong way—she just assumed they were going back to Virginia—and they were headed somewhere else. So my grandma said, "John, where in the world are we going?" And my grandpa said, "Well, Rose, we're going to Detroit." And she said, "Why in the world are we going to Detroit?" And he said, "Because I don't want my boys to grow up to be coal miners." And so they got as far as Indiana and ran out of gas—and that's how I got here. – Rich Mullins

What did Mullins’s grandfather know about farming?  Probably Jack Crap, but by the time he passed, he owned his own.  What did I know about 25-bed hospitals and sub-zero cold?  Roughly as much.

Eventually every adult comes to a place where he (she) must nut up (ovary up) or shut up.  If you don’t, quit whining so I can go back to my regularly scheduled human interest stories.  I hear a cat saved a boy from a dog attack.

And a side note for those without anyone they care about enough to find a different job or move to BFE, the Beach Boys weren’t kidding about Mid-west farmers’ daughters and Northern girls.  I can officially say that, because after surviving a -40 winter, the Shieldmaiden officially qualifies as a Northern girl.

The Squirt

Started 04/28/2014 (What can I say?  I've been busy.):

And in one of the longest weeks I've ever had, our youngest and hopefully last child busted his way into the world two weeks earlier than expected.  Not one to accept the comfort of a warm restful existence, the Squirt insisted on joining us in the cold, harsh reality that is the world.

Less than a week old, and I already have doubts about his judgment.

Unfortunately, the cold, harsh reality that is the world did not want him out yet.  After dropping him off at the nursery, I made my way to the PACU to see how the Shieldmaiden was faring.  On my way back, I called my sister with the announcement.  I rounded the corner to the big observation window in the nursery and found myself staring at a room with the doctor, two nurses, and a radiology tech.  Usually, this sort of thing is not considered "a good sign," so despite the manifold opportunity for a bar joke, I ended the call with a simple deadpan, "Well, that's interesting.  I should probably go."

Not something your average parent wants to see.

Eventually, I was sent off to pack a bag for a possible flight to the nearest NICU in Great Falls.  I was cautioned not to tell the Shieldmaiden, lest she get overly concerned.  By the time I returned, a decision had been reached, and the flight team was on the way.

Make a prison break, and they stick you in solitary.

After a quick huddle with all interested parties, the conclusion was reached that perhaps it would be best if I went home and grabbed some rack time, then drive in the morning so that I had a way to get us both home.  I ran home, grabbed a double shot of NyQuil, and slept for almost an entire four hours (Through some experimentation, I have discovered that each shot of NyQuil provides two hours of sleep for me.  Your mileage may vary).

After waking up at the ungodly hour of 0400, I loaded out and drove off to Great Falls.  I tend to get drowsy at the wheel on drives greater than two hours (especially short-sleeped), but I had a plan:  drive until I started getting sleepy, pull over, and take a nap in the back.  Brilliant plan.

Unfortunately, my phone kept receiving texts.  Then, when I did manage to doze off for about ten minutes there was a rap on my window.  I looked up to find a Montana State Trooper with a quizzical expression.  After explaining to him that no, I wasn't injured, no my car wasn't broken, and no, the beer bottle I had parked next to was not mine (seriously, umpteen thousand miles of highway in this state and I park next to eight inches of beer bottle), he ran my license and asked when I was planning on hitting the road.  After I replied 1000, he suggested I pull off a quarter mile down the road next to a pair of grain elevators because in 45 minutes, I'd probably have my sleep interrupted two more times.  He also expressed surprise that I had made it thirty minutes without anybody else checking on me.

Ah, Montana.  Where stopping for hitchhikers and fellow motorists is expected, not condemned.  Also, traffic was light, which explains the lack of assistance I received.

A 5 Hour Energy and two cups of coffee later, I arrived in Great Falls without further incident.  I found my way to the NICU with my bag o' junk, got my ID checked, and went in to see my son.

Still not something your average parent likes to see.

No, the camo was not my idea.  Ah, Montana.

That  afternoon,they pulled the nasal cannula.  That night, they pulled the feeding tube and went to bottles.  The next morning, they told me that his blood cultures were negative, so they were finishing the last round of antibiotics and discharging him that afternoon.  A quick car seat check (They changed the handle recommendations back to lowered position only this year.  This will probably change back next year.), a final bottle, and the Squirt and I went on our first man's road trip.  He didn't seem all that thrilled.

A quick stop to drop the newborn off with his food supply mother, and then back home to crash with some Ambien.  Next morning, I picked up my now-clingy toddlers (who stayed that way for the next two weeks) and off to introduce them to their new sibling.

All's well that ends well.

By then the Shieldmaiden was ready for discharge, which was good, because I really hate being alone with two toddlers, especially since the infamous coloring-on-the-walls-in-the-same (closed) room-with-Dada-less-than-six-feet-away episode.  I still don't know where she hid that crayon.

Now, of course, the real fun begins.